


To get home will take something I'm not sure if I have left

by HistoriaGloria



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, The Slaughter, post episode 160
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-20
Updated: 2019-12-20
Packaged: 2021-03-09 02:15:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,689
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21866023
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HistoriaGloria/pseuds/HistoriaGloria
Summary: Jon and Martin at the end of all things. Injuries are not uncommon, but it doesn't mean either of them have to like them.
Relationships: Martin Blackwood/Jonathan Sims
Comments: 7
Kudos: 161





	To get home will take something I'm not sure if I have left

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, this was inspired by a a tumblr post which I really love.  
I would say I'm sorry about the amount of JonMartin I'm writing but it has taken me over. I have plans for a nice long AU which I'm very excited about!  
I hope you like this stupid h/c fest
> 
> Title from Brave by Riley Pearce:  
'The maps are gone, so are our footprints too  
To get home now will take something that I'm not sure that I have left  
Trying, I'm trying to be brave.'

Travelling south on foot had seemed like such a good idea. In the end, it wasn’t like they had any choice. After the Watcher’s Crown had been completed and Martin had managed to calm Jon down, they both knew they had to get back to the Institute. Destroy Jonah. Find Basira. Find Daisy. Destroy Jonah. Protect Melanie and Georgie. Fix the world. Destroy Jonah.

And so, southward on foot they go. It is slow going. They avoid larger settlements as much as possible, scrounging food whenever they can find it (though Jon needs it less than Martin) and sleeping rough. They’ve been doing okay, managing to get out of Scotland before something finds them.

It is The Slaughter, that much is clear, but it isn’t willing to let them just flee. Vicious, snarling people with anything that could be a weapon, falling to The Slaughter’s swan song. Martin isn’t sure why it doesn’t call to him or Jon. He isn’t honestly sure he wants to inspect the aspects of their inhumanity in any detail.

Not falling to The Slaughter however has different issues; namely this small army it has gathered attempting to kill both him and Jon. They’re running, desperate and panicked, and Martin can hear Jon’s heavy breathing beside him, their hands clasped tightly together. Behind them, the Slaughter’s army is starting to turn on itself, as it does, but they’re still pursuing them.

Ahead, Martin spots a sharp turn in the road out of this no-good village, behind a large building and he tugs Jon along, into an empty alley. They press themselves up against a wall and Jon’s free hand is over his mouth. Martin catches on quickly and tries to muffle his own sharp breaths. They stay there, clinging to each other’s hands desperately as they hear the town tear itself asunder. Martin feels like he is fairly used to hearing horrible sounds but the gargling, screaming and begging that comes from these people that he can’t see as they kill each other…

It hurts to hear it.

A faint whimper escapes him, and Jon squeezes his hand sharply. Martin forces the sound down; they have to be quiet.

It feels like hours the final sounds of violent murder come to an end. Martin doesn’t actually know how much time has passed, likely only a few minutes, but it feels like forever. They wait, holding their breath, but all is silent. It is then that Martin notices how pale Jon is.

“Jon?” he hisses, gripping his hand tightly. The archivist turns to him, his eyes wide.

“Martin, I, I don’t…” is all he manages to say before his eyes roll back in his head, fainting dead away. Martin only just manages to strangle his yelp as he catches Jon. He’s so much bigger than him; he always has been, but Jon looks tiny in his arms, cradled to Martin’s chest.

“Jon! Jon, c’mon,” he hisses, panicked. It’s only then that Martin realises his hand is comes away wet when he touches Jon’s back. He shifts and there is no mistaking the thick red liquid on his fingers. A couple of The Slaughter-filled villagers had had hunting rifles and when they had run, Martin had heard the crack of gunfire. But they had just kept running. Jon had kept running with a bullet in his back. They can’t stay here, it isn’t safe, but Jon is limp in his arms. Gritting his teeth, Martin moves to the edge of the alley, Jon cradled to his chest. He can’t see anything, no more Slaughter-infused people. And so, Martin starts to creep out of the alley. He needs to find somewhere they can hole up so he can take care of Jon.

* * *

It only takes Martin ten minutes to find an empty and unlocked house. He leaves Jon on the sofa and goes to rifle through the things left here, managing to find some supplies. Running back into the living room, he notices that Jon hasn’t shifted all.

“Jon? Jon, can you hear me?” he hisses, nudging him gently. The archivist had whimpered and moaned as Martin had run through the streets, but now he is worryingly silent. Martin’s heart plummets and he shoves the supplies aside, desperately pressing his fingers to Jon’s throat. His hands are shaking so badly he can’t feel a pulse at all and Martin curses.

Inhale. Exhale.

He steadies himself and tries again. There. Weak and unsteady, but Jon does still have a pulse. It occurs to him only after his short panic attack that Jon had spent 6 months without a pulse and had still got up and walked away. Martin isn’t sure how he, in the middle of nowhere, could have tested Jon’s brainwaves to see if he was still living. He takes a moment to choke down his panic before he gently rolls Jon onto his back. Lifting up Jon’s shirt, he can see the entry wound for the bullet in his lower back, just about his hip. There is no corresponding exit wound so the bullet, the bullet infused with all of the power of The Slaughter, still sits in Jon. Unwanted, Martin’s mind gives him an image of Melanie just before he truly joined Peter Lukas, furious and vicious and by god, Martin never wants Jon to end up like that.

“I’m so sorry, Jon,” Martin whispers as he picks up the stolen set of tweezers from the half-empty first aid kit he had found. In his other hand is a bottle of whiskey; there had been no antiseptic in the kit, but there had been some spirits in the cabinet downstairs.

“This isn’t going to be comfortable.” Martin steels himself and washes the wound with alcohol before pressing the tweezers into the entry hole.

It takes him nearly a minute to find the bullet. Jon doesn’t wake but he makes some heart-wrenching sounds of pain. Martin spends the time apologising, but finally, he manages to extract the bullet, his hands wet with Jon’s blood. He washes the wound with whiskey and bandages it with scarves and fabric strips in lieu of actual bandages.

Then he runs to the bathroom to vomit.

The apocalypse and all of the bullshit that they had dealt with before has certainly toughened Martin up, but he is still weak at the idea of hurting Jon. He washes his shaking hands until they are red raw and rinses his mouth out. Then, he moves to take up vigil beside Jon.

* * *

It takes almost two hours for Jon to regain consciousness. Martin sits there, taking occasional sips of the whiskey to calm his nerves when Jon whimpers and groans.

“Shh, shh, it’s okay, it’s okay, Jon,” Martin says immediately, reaching down to brush the locks of hair from his partner’s face. Jon’s eyes blink open and he glances around from his side-long position on the couch.

“M’rtin? Where?” he manages to cough out and Martin just hushes him gently again.

“Some empty, unlocked house. They’re all dead, Jon. Tore themselves apart.”

“That’s The Slaughter for you,” Jon grunts and moves as though to roll on to his back before yelping in pain.

“Easy! Easy there, you got shot.” Martin gently rubs Jon’s shoulder until he stops shifting.

“Agh, that makes sense. It wasn’t healing?” Jon sounds confused.

“The bullet was still in your back, you idiot!” yelps Martin and Jon tilts his head to give him a look of partial affection and partial exasperation.

“I see. Thank you, Martin,” he murmurs. Martin doesn’t have to ask what for. He just gives Jon half a smile and runs a hand through his hair.

“Are you okay?” he asks quietly. Jon makes a faint, disagreeable sound. “I haven’t been able to find any painkillers.”

“Short of morphine, nothing works anymore anyway,” Jon mutters into the sofa cushions. “This is rather uncomfortable though.”

“There’s a bedroom in the back. We should lay low here for a while, just until you are more healed. I, ah, I can protect us.” Martin flushes a little. He doesn’t enjoy using the powers of The Lonely; it makes him feel like he is slipping away. But desperate times, desperate measures.

And these are definitely desperate times.

Jon nods and shifts slowly, trying to slide his legs down off the sofa, but his body collapses almost immediately. He bites his lip so hard trying to contain his pained whine that he draws blood.

“Oh, shit, Jon. Breathe, just breathe, I’ll carry you,” Martin frets, scooping Jon up. He curls up against Martin’s chest, whimpering imperceptibly.

“Thank you, Martin.” He carries him into the bedroom at the back of the house. Martin just smiles and presses a kiss to his head.

“You’re always welcome. I love you, Jon.” They say it a lot. After so many years of loving Jon with nothing to come of it, every time he hears Jon say he loves him, his chest swells. Besides, Martin needs it after The Lonely. He needs to know that Jon is there and feels the same way.

“Love you too, Martin,” Jon mumbles, the words slurring together a little as he begins to doze off, even as Martin places him down on the bed. “Stay?”

“I wouldn’t even think of leaving,” Martin chuckles, which earns a tiny smile out of Jon. He sits down as Jon succumbs once more to sleep. Martin just smiles.

It might be hard and uncomfortable here at the end of all things, but honestly, he wouldn’t want to go through it with anyone else. He concentrates, drawing in the fog of the Lonely to protect them and runs a hand gently over Jon’s back. Jon, even through the pain, looks softer in his sleep and Martin _yearns_. He adores him so much and he is unspeakably glad that Jon feels the same way.

The end of the world may be an unconventional, uncomfortable and unhelpful place to attempt to cultivate a relationship, but it doesn’t surprise Martin.

Jon and he have always been unusual, and they’ll get through this together.

They don’t have to be alone anymore.

**Author's Note:**

> Come bother me on tumblr and twitter, HistoriaGloria!


End file.
